News Hersheypark Announces 2020 Season Pass Structure

[b.mac]

Two days before the announcement of their 2020 roller coaster, Hershey has announced their season pass holder structure along with special monthly rates for those who sign up early.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=2361393110582807

View: https://www.facebook.com/Hersheypark/videos/2361393110582807/


https://www.hersheypark.com/tickets/season-passes.php

This structure comes with an all season dining plan at an additional $105 dollars, and an All Year Fast Track Pass for the staggeringly high price of $799 under the current sale deal. Outside of this sale timeframe, which ends July 31st, the price for All Year Fast Track will come in at $940.

 

[GrandpaD]

That's a ton of Hershey bars.

 

[b.mac]

For a 180 operating day season that is approx. 5 Hershey Bars per visit if you visited every day.

 

[GrandpaD]

Visual of a holiday weekend..

 

[warfelg]

FWIW, the reason it's so high is they oversold them this year, and even with fast pass you are still waiting an average of 10-15 minutes. Average line times at Hersheypark this year has been about 45-65 minutes.

 

[b.mac]

FWIW, the reason it's so high is they oversold them this year, and even with fast pass you are still waiting an average of 10-15 minutes. Average line times at Hersheypark this year has been about 45-65 minutes.

Yep, they set the price to gauge interest in the program. Expect the All Day Fast Track price to go up as well since it was low as $50 on some days.

 

[warfelg]

Yep, they set the price to gauge interest in the program. Expect the All Day Fast Track price to go up as well since it was low as $50 on some days.

Agreed.

FWIW HP has HORRENDOUS crowd management problems. They average 3 corporate outings a day + hotel Hershey + pass holders + GP. Their park is double BGWs size with 3-4 times the crowd.

 

[BGWnut]

Agreed.

FWIW HP has HORRENDOUS crowd management problems. They average 3 corporate outings a day + hotel Hershey + pass holders + GP. Their park is double BGWs size with 3-4 times the crowd.

So from what I can find online HP is actually smaller than BGW and considerably so. They have 121 acres and BGW is listed at 383 according to quick search I did on Google. I'm not sure if that figure includes the Zoo or not. It does include the waterpark which the BGW number does not. Granted HP is much more compacted together than BGW and fits more attractions in their space than BGW does.

Also on the crowds the numbers aren't as different as you might think for the two parks. If you add WCUSA attendance to BGW then from there last year I knew the numbers BGW had higher attendance.

My point is that you are right about HP having horrendous crowd management. That's what makes it feel like they have 3-4 more people than BGW.

 

[warfelg]

Are you counting all the unused BGW land? If you are BGW is a HUGE park. Do the actual used land and BGW isn’t all that big.

 

[BGWnut]

I'm not sure if the figure is taking into account the entire property or if the figure is just the developed property. If it's the entire property then the number would be more in the range of 180 acres because BGW currently uses approximately half of it's land. That's still significantly larger than HP.

 

[warfelg]

Ok, so smaller (500,000 sq ft) and bigger crowds (700,000). That's even worse.

Either way, Hersheypark is starting to price their pass structure, food plan, and fastpass to reflect that they now hold a premium in ability to do certain things. Also keep in mind this fast pass and pass increases is accounting for the addition of Chocolatetown, the nearly 20 acres it's going to add to the park, the new dining options.

 

[lce]

Just used a measurement tool.

Not counting parking lots, the developed (guest-occupying area) of BGW clocks in at 106 acres while developed Hershey clocks 74 acres.

Granted these are rough estimates from a Google maps plugin, but they are far enough apart to show BGW as larger to me.

 

[BGWnut]

Ok, so smaller (500,000 sq ft) and bigger crowds (700,000). That's even worse.

Either way, Hersheypark is starting to price their pass structure, food plan, and fastpass to reflect that they now hold a premium in ability to do certain things. Also keep in mind this fast pass and pass increases is accounting for the addition of Chocolatetown

BGW actually has higher attendance if you factor in WCUSA to the attendance. I can't speak to current numbers but this is based on the last year I know what the attendance numbers were. BGW itself is less than HP but HP also a water park and it's included in their admission and their total park. Because of this I think to compare you have to add BGW and WCUSA together when comparing.

I do agree with you that HP is certainly shifting their strategy in an effort to better control their crowds. My initial point is that the reason HP feels so much busier is because they have been horrendous at crowd management so then changing these things are good because hopefully it'll improve their crowd management.